Green Hydrogen, Is India ready to take on the world?

In the run-up to the 18th G20 Summit, a day-long conference on "Green Hydrogen Pilots in India" was held in New Delhi, on 5th September 2023, Delivering the inaugural address, Union Minister for Power and New & Renewable Energy, Shri R. K. Singh said that that India will emerge as a huge exporter and the world will come to follow our approach on green hydrogen. He said that World shipping will go green within around 10 years. So, we must emerge as refueling destination for all green ships.

The National Green Hydrogen Mission, approved by the Union Cabinet on 4th January 2023 aims at making India a global hub of Green Hydrogen production, utilization and export. There is a target of producing five million metric tonnes of green hydrogen per annum with an associated renewable energy capacity of about 125 GW by 2030 under the mission.

Ministry of New and Renewable Energy defines Green Hydrogen as ‘hydrogen produced using renewable energy, including, but not limited to production through electrolysis or conversion of biomass’.

For Electrolysis based hydrogen, the carbon intensity is defined as less than 2kg of CO2e per kg pf hydrogen for a period of 12 months. Non biogenic GHG emissions arising from water treatment, electrolysis, gas purification, drying and compression is considered here.

For biomass-based hydrogen, non-biogenic GHG emissions arising from biomass processing, heat/steam generation, conversion of biomass to hydrogen, gas purification, drying and compression must be less than 2kg of CO2e per kg pf hydrogen for a period of 12 months.

Frameworks and detailing of conditions for differentiating ‘green hydrogen’ and labelling them ‘green’ and also align with international norms which can enable export of hydrogen need to be set up. MNRE has nominated Bureau of Energy Efficiency (BEE) as the nodal authority for accreditation of agencies for monitoring, verification and certification of Green Hydrogen Production Projects. Methods of governance, verification, and tracking including chain of custody, carbon accounting, credit issuing, and retirement need to be defined.?

Roles and responsibilities of Standard & certification owner, certificate issuing body and registry, Data handling protocol, Enforcement mechanism and non-compliance clauses are things which need to be brought in. Audit and verification based on standard criteria must be in place. Standards like ISO 14067 Green House Gases- Carbon footprint of products – Requirements and guidelines for quantification can be considered and put in place.

A standard need to be drafted to include the technical components of the certification scheme, which is inline with international settings so that export of hydrogen is enabled. All stakeholders like manufacturers, sellers, buyers, customers, trade associations, users and regulators must contribute to the making of the standard.

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Greenhouse Gas Emissions Scope:

It is important to define a clear system boundary defined to capture well-to-gate or well-to-wheel pathways in the standard specifying the main emission sources in the production supply chain including electricity, upstream fugitive emissions, capture unit etc. International Partnership for Hydrogen and Fuel Cells in the Economy (IPHE) methodology for Determining the Green House Has Emissions Associated with the Production of Hydrogen, is being established by ISO as a process.

MNRE’s definition defines non-biogenic emissions limits but it excludes greenhouse gas emissions associated with electricity use for electrolysis and compression. Hence only scope 1 emissions are considered scope 2 is not considered. This can be a problem as we are making plans to be a major hydrogen exporter.

The greenhouse gas intensity for the biomass used in hydrogen production in not clearly defined. IPHE defines it as “any bio-feedstock that is not deliberately produced and is otherwise unlikely to be valorized in the country of origin”.? Biomass feedstock transfer, biogas leakage, energy requirements of CO2, compression and transport of CO2, all these need to be taken into account.

It is important to define the production process of hydrogen also for evaluating the emission impact of the production processes, for example, process of upstream system to pretreat wood to wood chips for gasification processes, or the process for the upstream system to deliver biogas mixture for upgrading and/or reforming.

As hydrogen certification or labelling is still evolving it is important to put in place a proper chain of custody for tracking: the process of sequentially transferring custodial ownership of materials and resources throughout a supply chain. It must be based on mass flows between production stages and the mass of the end product must be accounted for by the masses of inputs introduced, throughout the supply chain. The credibility of the chain of custody along with certificates is very important. It is important for India to have an account standard for different sources of hydrogen along the full supply chain which is recognised internationally to enable exports. The current MNRE definition does not include hydrogen carriers like ammonia or methanol which too must be considered.

Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism (CBAM), one of the elements of the EU Green Deal, the goal of which is to reduce GHG emissions by 55% by 2030 will apply to the import of hydrogen to the EU starting October 1, 2023. The intent is to prevent “carbon leakage” wherein high carbon costs in one region led to businesses to relocate to areas with no strict environmental regulations leading to no net reduction in emissions at global levels. Carbon prices are integrated into the product itself making them expensive which in turn can be used for incentivizing green products/practices.

For the period October 1, 2023 – December 31, 2025, quarterly reporting of the greenhouse gas footprint (direct and indirect). From 2026, CBAM certificates linked to carbon pricing to cover GHG emissions will also be required.

To achieve hydrogen exports which we have planned as India’s Green Hydrogen mission, this can be a challenge and we need to align our internal regulations and definitions as per our export strategy to align with CBAM (in Europe) and Clean Competition Act (CCA of USA) [there are significant differences between the two], different definitions of green hydrogen in different places, different renewable banking policies.

We need to get our priorities right, set our goals and chart a course to reach the goal and take actions aligning with our goals and course. Or we will end up having a difficult time competing with other countries to get to the desired pricing levels.

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